Tag: meditation

Quick note – this is not perfect or comprehensive. This is what’s occurring to me now to share with you in a moment of my own crisis. If I’ve missed something big, please feel free to leave a comment.

Your root chakra is at the base of all your chakras. It’s responsible for your spine, your feet, your kidneys, and way more. It’s also closely tied to your feelings of safety and security.

Your root chakra is associated with the color red primarily, and meditating on or surrounding yourself with the color red can help you to realign your root chakra.

When your root chakra is working as it should, you’re confident and secure with in your place in the world. When it isn’t, you’re likely to experience a variety of issues.

Out of Balance or Blocked Root Chakra

When your root chakra is out of balance or blocked, you’re likely to be angry, insecure, and just feel as if you’re constantly on the edge of fight or flight. You might also have physical pain, especially in your lower back. Modern Western medicine is quick to dismiss the chakra system, but some physicians are opening up to the possibilities that this area, the lower back and sacral area in particular, have some ties to how you’re feeling on an emotional level.

Why Tell You This Today?

Let me tell you something before we get to fixing imbalances.

I woke up today angry. Not just angry, but absolutely furious at my deepest core. This past weekend’s events in Charlottesville, VA were horrifying and evil. Not unsurprising, unfortunately, considering that white supremacy and racism are the very foundations upon which this nation was built.

And this needs to change. “Smash the white supremacist patriarchy” is on my to do list every single day. Every day. Marginalized groups everywhere have to deal with this every day and if you’re white? It’s now your fight, too.

So yesterday, when Tangerine Nightmare stood in front of a bank of reporters and claimed that counter-protesters were violent and that white supremacists were really great folks, I lost my grip a bit on reality. I have never been so angry in my life.

WE MUST DO BETTER. And when I woke up just as angry with my lower back aching and screaming, I knew I had to get a grip or I would be useless.

If you are angry, you have to be able to channel that anger into action. That’s what anger is really good for: Serving as fuel for the action that is to come.

I remembered that we are living in the Time of Towers and I visualized a better world. Destruction must come before rebuilding, but it’s hard. So hard. I know that I am here for a reason, even if I don’t fully understand that reason yet.

By the time I left the salt bath, I wasn’t just calmer. My back didn’t hurt anymore and I could think clearly. The fire in my root has direction.

Now, just because this worked for me today, that doesn’t mean it would work for me every time my root chakra is out of whack.

Fixing Imbalances in Your Root Chakra

There is SO much you can do for a blocked root chakra.

Mantras and Affirmations

Mantras and affirmations give your brain something to settle on and to hold while you center yourself. Used regularly, they can even be the source of your centering. Mantras to use for your root chakra:

I am safe.

I am grounded.

I have all that I need.

I am at peace within my surroundings.

I trust.

I stand in my power.

I am connected.

I am abundant.

Crystals

In general, you’re going to want grounding stones, like hematite, black tourmaline, smokey quartz. Also, red stones work wonders. Red jasper, red carnelian, garnet, ruby. Don’t have one of these crystals available? Search for a picture and invite the stone in the picture to help you. May seem woo woo, but it can work, so don’t knock it.

Essential Oils

You can get all complicated with this or simply put a few drops of the oil you choose from this list into an inhaler. {affiliate link} When you need extra help, take a few deep breaths from the inhaler. So, oils:

Frankincense

Myrrh

Sandalwood

Cedarwood

Ylang ylang

Rosemary

Patchouli

Palo santo

Grounding/Earthing

So many people make this so complicated. It doesn’t have to be. Go sit outside. Plant your butt or your feet directly on the earth and just be for a few minutes. If you’re lucky enough to have a wooded area, go deeply into it. Can’t do any of that? Close your eyes and imagine roots going deep into the earth. Don’t have time for that or you’re doing something like driving? Put your hand over your heart and take five or six super deep breaths.

Salt Cleansing

Saltis incredibly cleansing, particularly in terms of energy. That link is to a search for different options for energetic cleansing with salt. Most people recommend sea salt, but Epsom salts work fantastically well. Also, most people are deficient inmagnesium and could use a dunk in Epsom salts now and again.

Energy Brushing

In a pinch, brushing the energy of your aura can help you to do some good for your root and other chakras. Start with a hand at the base of your belly, a few inches under your belly button. Hold your hands parallel to your body, about an inch or two away, and sweep upwards and outwards. You’re disrupting the flow and helping to create a more positive flow of energy.

Meditation

Meditating can do so, so much for you. It calms your brain and allows you to focus. But it’s not difficult. Sit in a quiet, comfortable spot. Clear your brain as much as you can and focus on your breathing. When a thought pops in, not if – when, refocus on your breathing. The idea here isn’t that you’re going to fully clear your brain, because you won’t. What you’re doing is giving your brain a break. It gets easier, so stick with it. Also, if you’re new to meditating, don’t go for a half hour out of the gate. Start with a minute. Two minutes. Work your way up.

Energy Healing and Clearing

Use Reiki, if you can, to help clear your energy. So many practitioners, me included, offer free group Reiki sessions. I offer a free mid-month Reiki group sessionevery month over on my Facebook page. Stop by, click “Going,” and you’re signed up. If you need more intensive Reiki, let me know. There are tons of other options, such asSoulClicks. Gwynne explains it so much better than I could, so read her post about her unique energy system. Find what works for you and what you love.

Dance, Move, Get Active

The root chakra is your base, your root. It’s all about movement and physicality. Move, get active. Do whatever is within your ability to do. Have an impromptu dance party with your favorite music. Go for a run. Do yoga or Pilates. Do something active.

Meet Your Physical Needs

Remember, the root chakra is all about security, safety. If your needs aren’t being met, you’re not going to feel safe and secure. Have you eaten? When did you last have a big glass of water? Look for whatever physical needs you need to meet now and solve those issues if at all possible.

There’s more. There’s so much more, but this is already so very long. These basics should help you get started. Remember: Your root chakra is your base. If it’s out of balance and not working properly, the rest of you will have a difficult time functioning.

A few months ago I started getting a specific message during meditation and at other times. I kept hearing that I needed to work on aligning my life. What the what? How the hell was I gonna do that? I didn’t even understand what the phrase meant. My coffee pot helped me to figure out what aligning could mean and what it had to do with improving my flow.

So, when you see the phrase “align yourself,” what do you think? Like I said, I didn’t know what to think at all. And the message kept popping up. Every time I turned around, it seemed that’s what I would hear. At the time, I was trying to shove a square peg into a round hole in my professional life. I wanted to launch a very specific business and it wasn’t working. I couldn’t figure out why and I was frustrated.

So Frustrated

I was also frustrated with a lot of other things. My time management. My energy levels. My failed idea for a side business. My freaking coffee pot.

Wait, what?

Yeah, my coffee pot. We have one of those Mr. Coffee 4-cup coffee makers. It’s about a million years old, but I do love it. It makes just enough coffee to fill up my husband’s travel mug for the trip to work and still leaves me with a full cup of coffee. Well, let’s be honest, my mug holds more like two cups of coffee, but still. We both get coffee and I only have to wait for the one pot to brew.

But here’s the thing. I was starting to have trouble pouring coffee out of the pot. It was constantly dribbling over the side, no matter how I tried pouring the coffee. And I started noticing that even though I was holding the handle, the spout seemed to be all askew. I didn’t think it had ever done that before, but nothing had changed, right?

So I grumbled. For MONTHS. And wiped up coffee spills and dribbles. For MONTHS. Sometimes I can be kind of clueless, as we all can be, really, especially at 6am before a cup of coffee. I was so frustrated that I was determined to get a new coffee maker. I mean, this one was beyond ancient, after all, right?

Meanwhile, midway through the coffee pot drama, I’m getting the message about aligning my life.

Ding!

One day, I look at the coffee pot and I realize that it’s not bolted or riveted or even attached to the glass carafe at all. There’s a stainless steel band around the bottom of the carafe that holds the bottom of the handle and the top of the handle has a lip that pops over the top edge of the glass carafe.

Over time, what has happened is the band and the lip have gradually worked their way around the carafe, putting the handle out of alignment with the spout of the carafe.

Once I realized the problem, I gently slid the carafe around until the spout and the handle were opposite each other again. They aligned. And the next time I poured coffee? It was perfect, wonderful, amazing. The coffee flowed just the way it was supposed to.

Aligning My Life

So what the hell does my coffee pot problem have to do with the message I kept getting?

A lot, it turns out.

The next time I meditated and heard that I needed to align myself and my life, I stopped and changed the question. Instead of asking what that meant, I asked how to do it. I got some answers, which surprised me at first, but I started following those answers and realized that they really did help. {NB: I’ll talk about all of these in more depth in individual posts because I think that they’re worth going into much more detail.}

My Methods

One answer that I received was that I needed to meditate by myself. That was interesting, because I’d been meditating quite a bit, but I was using guided meditations. See, I’ve never been able to meditate on my own. It always felt awkward and weird and I just couldn’t seem to do it. But now, I gave it a try.

I started using my pendulum more. That’s helped me to build some self-trust and it’s also helped me with sorting through some issues. If you’re new to pendulums or dowsing, I highly recommend Pendulum Mojo by Amy Scott Grant {affiliate link}. I’ve read other stuff about pendulums and dowsing before and, honestly, they didn’t resonate with me at all. I get Amy and her advice works for me.

I started paying more attention to my crystals and carrying them with me. I’ve always collected crystals, but I usually didn’t have them on me. I’ve also found that although I had plenty of gemstone jewelry, I didn’t get the same feeling that I did from having a crystal on its own next to my skin.

I got much more serious about using Reiki regularly. I’m finishing up the course now for my Reiki Master certification and I honestly think this is one of the best things I’ve ever done. Reiki is transformative and I want to share it as much as I can.

I started using oracle cards, journaling, and venturing into Akashic record study. These are all still works in progress, but I’ll be sharing as I learn more.

The Results?

Right away the flow of my life changed. I didn’t feel like I was constantly fighting my way up stream. Are there days that I still have a rough go of it? Of course. But I take a deep breath and I focus back on what helps me with aligning my life. That’s part of why I started One Cricket Chirping, in fact. I wanted to share what I was experiencing and what helped me.

So tell me, when you hear the phrase “aligning my life,” what does it mean for you?